Chapter 1173: The Script Seems Off
While these testers were either terrified or wreaking havoc in the game, every move they made was recorded and uploaded. Special personnel would review their gameplay, and occasionally, Chen Mo would take a look as well.
At this moment, Chen Mo was watching Jiang Huan’s game screen. This new tester, holding a wire cutter in one hand and a pot lid in the other, was following Mia out the door. It had to be said, the scene was somewhat comical, as neither the wire cutter nor the pot lid were proper weapons or armor. Still, Chen Mo felt like giving this tester a thumbs up for his resourcefulness.
Many people knew that Thunderbolt Interactive had dedicated game testers, but they didn’t understand why Chen Mo used such strict standards to recruit them. Everyone assumed these testers were used to test particularly extreme horror or gory games, to see if they would negatively impact players’ mental health, and then decide whether the game could be released. That was one reason, but not the only one.
A more important role was that Chen Mo wanted to see what unexpected things players would do in a game with extremely high freedom, and whether the game itself could handle that “unexpectedness.” In simpler terms, he wanted to see if the game’s story could still develop normally after granting players high freedom.
Take the current situation, for example. In the original design of Resident Evil 7 from his past life, Ethan had no weapons when he first met Mia. He had a wire cutter, but it could only be used to cut chains on doors, not for combat. As for the pot lid, it was even more absurd—it couldn’t be used as armor; it was just a scene interaction meant to annoy players.
But in the next-gen Resident Evil 7, all items were given realistic physical properties. Players could naturally use the pot lid as armor and the wire cutter as a weapon. Although the pot lid couldn’t perform parry moves like in Dark Souls, it was still a metal object, quite sturdy, and perfectly capable of blocking a couple of strikes.
From being unarmed to now having armor, the player’s combat power had significantly increased. So, the upcoming battle might not necessarily follow the original script. Chen Mo didn’t want these testers to play by the book; he hoped they would use their wits as much as possible to challenge the original “script” and steer the story off course. Only then could he gauge how “inclusive” this game truly was.
Because players were increasingly unsatisfied with linear, pre-planned gaming experiences. They wanted to use their intelligence to rewrite the protagonist’s fate. And Chen Mo was constantly experimenting in this direction. Jiang Huan showed exceptional talent in this regard, so Chen Mo couldn’t help but pay him extra attention.
…
Mia and the protagonist Ethan originally wanted to escape from this place, but in a moment of carelessness, Mia seemed to have been captured by someone. Jiang Huan searched for a long time but couldn’t find Mia anywhere. He figured it was probably a scripted death, so he continued looting first aid supplies without worry.
Moreover, as the number of items grew, the game’s essential four-dimensional pocket appeared. It had to be said, this was a necessary design choice. If it were realistic, Jiang Huan would have to carry a wire cutter and two large bottles of first aid medicine without even a shoulder bag—where would he put them all? Fortunately, now all these things could be thrown into the four-dimensional pocket. Even items picked up from the scene, like the pot lid, could be stuffed in. This was an improvement over the design from the Bloodborne era.
However, this four-dimensional pocket also had a capacity limit, and the pot lid took up quite a bit of space, so Jiang Huan simply kept holding it.
Pushing open a door, he saw a staircase leading downward. It was pitch black inside, with nothing visible, but eerie sounds came from below.
“Hah, so I have to go forward again, huh… Anyone with common sense would find this place suspicious, right?”
Jiang Huan slowly descended. Suddenly, he saw Mia crawling out of the darkness on all fours. The once gentle and lovely wife had transformed into a different face. Her features were bloated, veins bulging, like a corpse that had been soaked in water for a long time. Her eyes were murky, and her pale teeth seemed ready to bite.
The moment Jiang Huan saw her, Mia lunged at him, grabbed him, and threw him!
Jiang Huan hit the ground hard. As he tried to get up, he saw Mia already standing in front of him. With a sharp shriek, Mia swung a sharp kitchen knife and stabbed at Jiang Huan!
If the player had nothing in their hands, they would have to block with their arms. In the original plot, that’s exactly what happened—the player’s palm would be pierced by the kitchen knife, creating a bone-deep sense of fear. But Jiang Huan had the pot lid in his hand now…
He raised the pot lid with his left hand to block the knife, then pulled out the wire cutter with his right and smacked Mia on the head!
Mia was stunned for a moment, but the next second, she lunged again, swinging the kitchen knife, trying to stab Jiang Huan to death!
At this point, the protagonist Ethan, played by Jiang Huan, was shouting, “Mia, wait! Calm down!”
In the original plot, the protagonist could only retreat and weakly block the knife with his hands. But Jiang Huan had no such intention. He charged forward with the pot lid, using it to block the knife while relentlessly hitting Mia’s head with the wire cutter.
In the original story, Mia was supposed to suddenly regain consciousness and knock herself out. But this time, she was knocked unconscious by Jiang Huan…
Until Mia collapsed to the ground, Jiang Huan hadn’t taken a single hit and was completely unharmed.
Mia lay on the floor, seemingly dead, completely lifeless. Jiang Huan didn’t buy it. With that level of combat power, dying from a few hits to the head? No way.
So, he silently picked up the kitchen knife Mia had dropped, pondering how to finish her off safely. Now, with a pot lid in his left hand and a kitchen knife in his right, his combat power had actually increased. No equipment? No problem—just take it from the enemy.
But this corpse gave off the feeling that it would likely rise again. What to do? Cut off the head? Chop off the hands? Stab the heart?
Hmm, all of them seemed a bit brutal…
But at this point, who cared about brutality? Jiang Huan raised the kitchen knife and stabbed it straight into Mia’s chest.
Just then, Mia did indeed rise again. Her face instantly twisted in front of Jiang Huan’s eyes, and she grabbed him, slamming him into the wall!
The old, decrepit wooden wall was smashed into a large hole. Even so, Jiang Huan held onto the kitchen knife tightly and didn’t let go even after being thrown.
According to the original plot, Mia was supposed to pull the kitchen knife from the wall and chase after him. But when she looked, the hole from the knife was still there, but the knife was gone…
Mia’s face was twisted in fury, but there was also a hint of confusion in that fury…